Originally Posted by
Eric Anderson
People ask about the right cymbal to purchase... How to pick them? how much to spend? etc. I like simple answers, and it took me some time to come up with simple answers to these questions. These are a couple of thoughts on buying cymbals...
1) Listen with your ears instead of your wallet/bank account. Your ears know what they want to hear from a cymbal. The ear also can hear how a prospective cymbal fits into your cymbal arsenal... and you know when you hear THAT perfect cymbal. Remember, you're not paying for a sheet of metal that's been hammered and or lathed. You're acquiring the right instrument that will become a part of your drumming personality. This concept leads to the second point...
2) Use the sticks you play in studio and on stage when test driving cymbals. Pro Mark makes a lot of its lines of sticks in both hickory and oak. Test a ride cymbal with a hickory 5A and then an oak 5A and you will hear a noticeable difference in sound quality and characteristics of the cymbal. Your sticks are every bit a part of your cymbal sound. Please do not use a porous hickory demo stick at the store when you play with dense oak sticks. You will quickly discover you bought the wrong cymbal for your sound's personality.
Your ears will know when they've found THAT cymbal so please listen to them. Your sticks are a big part of your cymbal sound so use them when test driving cymbals. These two ideas help to quickly sort through a lot of cymbals and get to the one that is the ideal purchase.